A pioneer of both African jazz and World Music, Hugh Masekela was equally notable as a social activist who spent 30 years in exile from his native South Africa as a tireless voice for the anti-apartheid movement.

His death Tuesday at the age of 78 in Johannesburg has inspired an outpouring of tributes from around the globe.

Some music fans remember Maskela for his 1987 “Graceland” tour with Paul Simon and Miriam Makeba, his international 1968 hit, “Grazing in the Grass” and his 1967 performance at the Monterey International Pop Festival, whose lineup also included Jimi Hendrix, Otis Redding and Janis Joplin.

Others remember him for such stirring anti-apartheid anthems as “Mandela (Bring Him Back Home),” “Mace and Grenades” and “Stimela (Coal Train),” which was sampled by American hip-hop star Talib Kweli for his 2006 song, “African Drum.”

Masekela and fellow South African music giant and anti-apartheid champion Makeba spoke to the San Diego Union in early 1990.

The joint interview by the couple, who were married from 1964 to 1966, was inspired by the release of imprisoned South African civil rights champion Nelson Mandela after 27 years by South Africa’s soon-to-fall apartheid government. .

Here is the complete text of that interview with Masekela and Makeba, who died in 2008.

News of Mandela music to their ears | Famed exiles moved by leader's release

By George Varga and Frank Green, San Diego Union, Feb. 13, 1990

When Miriam Makeba heard of Nelson Mandela's imminent freedom, she fell to her knees and wept.

Hugh Masekela spent the whole weekend in bed so he wouldn't miss a minute of television coverage.

"I feel — we all should feel — a bit freer today," Masekela said, referring to Mandela's release from a South African prison Sunday.

Makeba and Masekela are South Africa's most visible musicians-in-exile.

Outspoken opponents of the South African government and apartheid since their teens, they left their homeland in 1960, she after being exiled, he for artistic reasons.

In 1987, they were featured prominently on Paul Simon's "Graceland Tour," along with South African a cappella group Ladysmith Black Mambazo.

Makeba and Masekela spoke to the San Diego Union yesterday, Masekela from Washington, D.C., and Makeba from Brussels.

Miriam Makeba

As South Africa's best-known folk singer, Makeba, 56, has long sung out against apartheid and social injustice with grace and dignity.

To her followers, she is affectionately known as "Mama Africa" and "The Empress of African Song," a folk heroine who speaks softly but carries a big song.

So big, in fact, that she was permanently exiled from her homeland in 1960 when the South African government stamped her passport invalid. (To date, nine other countries have issued her honorary passports.)

A frequent participant in U.N. related projects and conferences, she was instrumental in funding a maternity hospital in Guinea, where she still works as a volunteer. Her most recent album is "Welela" (Mercury Records).

"When I heard the news — I saw it on French TV — I couldn't believe it.

Because, you know, they announced it a week ago and we waited and waited, and none of us believed it.

"When I saw Mr. de Klerk (South African President F.W. de Klerk) announce Mandela would come out on Sunday, I fell on my knees and wept. I've been away from home 30 years, and he's been in jail 27 years. We've all been waiting for this day, and suddenly it comes.

"I congratulate Mr. de Klerk for his courage. He did something his predecessors wouldn't dare do, even though we know it's because of pressure from people in our country who have died, and from our friends around the world who stayed with us on this question of releasing Mandela and imposing the sanctions. All of this played a role in bringing the South African government to its knees and to reason.

"The saddest thing for us is Mandela is released into a world of apartheid that is still here. There's still the state of emergency, we still can't vote, our children's schools are still segregated. Our people are still dying. They rejoice in the streets because of the release, and police fire on them.

"All I can say is, `Thank God, Mandela is out.' We ask our friends to keep up the pressure, so that Mandela and all our leaders will have strength to negotiate.

"Of course, we are worried about right-wing reactionaries in South Africa. But de Klerk should worry about that; we have dealt with reactionaries who have been against us for decades.

"I always said: ‘I hope it (Mandela's release) happens in my lifetime. I said: `If it never does, I have grandchildren, they'll continue and maybe they'll see it.'

“I'm glad to see him come out of jail after 27 years, and I'm glad I'm alive to see him on TV. I wish I were at home, even if I don't touch him, but just to see him in person.

"I've been away from home physically for 30 years, but I never left mentally or otherwise. I've always considered myself a South African, and I will die a South African.

"Even though there are different factions at home, I hope they're wise enough to get together and to have a common goal to help us reach the final goal — a South Africa free of apartheid, where everyone is free and there is equality for everyone, black and white."

Hugh Masekela

It has been more than 30 years since Hugh Masekela last saw Nelson Mandela.

They were standing together on a stage in a South African township to raise funds for the fledgling African National Congress (ANC). Masekela, then a teen-ager, played a mini-concert of "township bop," before Mandela stepped forward to rail against apartheid.

"I and the 500 people there were mesmerized," recalled Masekela. "In a few words, he was able to crystallize our hopes and aspirations."

Masekela, 50, has since gone on to international renown as a jazz trumpeter and flugelhornist. In 1967, he scored his only Top Ten record in the U.S., the propulsive "Grazing in the Grass."

"I'd like to feel happier about this. It's just that they didn't have the right to put Nelson in jail in the first place. They wasted 27 years of his life.

"I'm not pessimistic. I'm impatient.

"We've worked for 30 years to be recognized by that government as human beings. Now the government is just opening little doors to us — freeing Nelson, unbanning our political parties.

"They are still fighting us vehemently. In some townships, political parties are run by thugs financed from Cape Town. If we don't have support of the police, we can not have the ability to organize and to gain even a slight semblance of power. So it's discouraging.

"To get past all that, we have to stop the promulgation of tribalism, which divides the people. We have to promote nationalism.

"The government and the American media talk about compromises that have to be made by both sides. But the ANC has nothing. There are still 1,000 ANC members held by the government as political prisoners. The people are still oppressed, still disenfranchised. So there is nothing else for us to give."

Masekela then began singing a chorus of his 1985 song, "Bring Him Back Home."

"I want to see Nelson walking down the streets of South Africa, I want to see him walking hand-in-hand with Winnie Mandela.

"I grew up in the township of Alexandra supporting the ANC, and looking up to Nelson as a father figure. When I was a teen-ager, I was asked to play on an ANC tour. I was too young to be taken very seriously by Nelson and (ANC leader) Oliver Tambo.

"I think he is as safe out of prison as in. It is incumbent on the part of the government to make sure nothing happens to him.

"Just because Nelson has been released doesn't mean the government has done us any favors. We have nothing to be grateful for. The government destroyed our country, destroyed our people.